


as it is

by aviator8



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Immortal Clay | Dream (Video Blogging RPF), Literal Sleeping Together, M/M, Nostalgia, Prison, Reincarnation, Soulmates, Swearing, Time Travel, Time Travelling Karl Jacobs, but like. soulmates Lite tm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-15 23:09:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29815803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aviator8/pseuds/aviator8
Summary: “Does it ever get easier?”“What?”“Watching everyone you love die, and knowing you cannot join them.”And Dream, who has lived for a thousand years and will live for countless more, has to answer that no, it does not. “I guess—you get used to it. That's the best answer I can give you. But easier? Never. It’s like having your heart ripped out of your chest, again and again.”Or, Karl has to get better at goodbyes.
Relationships: Clay | Dream & Karl Jacobs, Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF), Karl Jacobs/Sapnap, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 10
Kudos: 152





	as it is

**Author's Note:**

> title from two slow dancers by mitski bc it gives me very much immortal character who has to watch their loved ones die, or sometimes time-travel karlnap
> 
> enjoy <3

Karl finds Tommy and Wilbur sitting in the grass, leaning against a tree while Wilbur strums on his guitar. And Karl--Karl knows that tree. It’s the only one that is left standing after L’Manberg is blown up for the first time.

He leans against one of the blackstone walls for a moment, taking in the sight. Two brothers in the country they built together, still trusting one another, Wilbur singing softly and Tommy talking his ear off, his hands occupied with braiding strands of grass. Wilbur doesn't seem to mind.

In a few short months, that tree will be reduced to ashes by the girl who loved it most. Tommy will be left with a few more scars and a few less loved ones. There will be a hole in the world where Wilbur once was.

So Karl watches them for a moment more. He is the memory-keeper, after all, the one who will tell their stories when they are gone. He thinks he owes it to the pair that they have a few good memories together in the future history books.

He walks over and Wilbur looks up and smiles. “Hey, it’s Karl, right? You new around here?”

He takes that as a cue to sit, so he does. “Yeah, something like that.”

Tommy snorts. “Something like that,” he says in a mocking tone. “Karl Jacobs, you are a pussy and I do not like you one bit.” There’s no malice in his tone, though, and Karl takes the verbal assault. He’s nostalgic for the days when Tommy’s jokes came from a place of genuine humor and amusement, and not just to deflect or defend or cope with a too-serious moment. He enjoys it while he can still live through it.

Wilbur whacks his brother’s shoulder. “Tommy!”

“Well, I don’t.”

Karl can't help it. He snorts.

“Even your laugh is stupid! You bitch!”

“You’re a child, Tomathy--”

“Do not call me that--”

“And I get so many more girls than you--”

“How dare you, how fucking _dare_ you, I have so many wives--”

Karl falls backward into the grass, cackling. Tommy hurls more meaningless insults at him, and Karl is glad that Tommy still has time to be a child. Still has time to laugh. 

Wilbur hums a note, then another. And his voice, even just two notes of it, is so captivating that Karl and Tommy shut the fuck up and listen, giggles subsiding. The now-President of L’Manberg possesses so much charisma and easy charm. That charisma and charm will later be warped beyond recognition into something dark and twisted, but for now, Karl will just admire Wilbur’s ability to command an audience. He leans back on his palms, stretching his legs out into the soft grass, and lets the tune wash over him.

Tommy is watching Wilbur, looking at his brother with such warmth and admiration that Karl’s heart aches. _Hold on,_ he wants to shout. _Hold on to that. You love each other. Don't throw that away._ But he is bound by law and honor and countless ancient spells whose origins he does not know, and he can change nothing about the past.

If he looks closely, Karl can almost see it. See the way the shadows under Tommy’s eyes in the late afternoon light will grow to be permanent, how the easy slouch of his shoulders will tighten under the weight of the world, how he’ll lose all the sun-kissed color in his skin in the Pogtopia ravine. See how Wilbur’s fingers, now curled loosely around the neck of his guitar, will obsessively trace over a certain wooden button, how his eyes will fill with a manic light, the wound in his chest he will beg his father to inflict. But here, in this moment in time, all he sees are two brothers leaning against a gnarled tree, carefree and smiling.

It’s hard, sometimes, to remember that these people whose stories he is compiling are actual _people_. Three-dimensional people with thoughts and feelings and consciousnesses. But Wilbur and Tommy are some of the most human people he’s met. They’re messy and loud, and both of them have fucked up, again and again. But, for as long as they could, they always got back up after getting knocked down. Karl admires them for that. Yes, attachment makes his job harder, but for these people, maybe it’s worth it.

The music washes over him, and he lets it carry him away.

. . . 

Sapnap is training.

Today is sometime after the war for L’Manberg independence and sometime before… all the rest of the wars. The people on this server have seen enough war to last a lifetime already, and they don’t even know what’s coming their way. Karl knows. He’s seen it all.

With what he knows, he guesses it’s good that Sapnap is training. He’ll need it. 

And, truthfully, he won't ever pass up on a shirtless and sweaty Sapnap. 

The dark-haired man is whirling around the training ring outside of his house like a devil from hell. The sword in his hand flashes in the dim light as he goes through a complicated series of maneuvers and steps. Across the lake, the community house glows warm on the water.

Karl leans on a fence post and watches Sapnap.

This time around, he’s been doing a good bit of watching.

He’s come back and relived these memories, his first few days in the SMP, enough that he could recite them by heart. But there’s always something new and fresh and, honestly, it’s nice seeing his friends happy and healthy again. These are the halcyon days. Why wouldn’t he want to stay here forever?

But the truth is that his power is--waning. His last trip to the In-Between hadn't been promising. He needs time to recharge. The fabric of space and time needs to stitch itself back up from where he’d been clawing through it. This is probably the last time he’ll visit this time period. The eternity of time lies ahead and before and all around him. It’s his for the taking. No matter how he can feel himself slipping away with each jump. It’s nothing a little rest and rejuvenation won’t fix, right?

Sapnap slows his brutal pace, sliding the sword into a weapon stand next to the ring and grabbing a sip from a waterskin. His shaggy hair is tied back into a little ponytail at the base of his neck and his eyes light up when he spots Karl and Karl thinks he has never loved the other man more than he does right now.

He’s not so afraid of leaving this time.

He’ll find Sapnap again. He always does.

Every reincarnation of Sapnap always finds Karl. He is the one constant in Karl’s ever-changing life. And he will always be thankful for that.

No matter what time period Karl jumps to, a man with dark hair and darker eyes and a penchant for fire and mischief is waiting just around the corner. Someday, Karl will retire from his lifestyle. He’ll shove his magic into a dusty corner of himself and not touch it again. And he will grow old with Sap. That’s the only future he can bring himself to care about, the future that’s been a beacon for every cold and lonely moment he’s faced, adrift in the tide of eternity.

“Hiya, Sap.”

“Hiya, Karl.” This Sapnap has only known Karl for a few weeks, but that doesn't matter. Sapnap and Karl always fall in love fast, in every time.

“Whaddya say about dinner?”

“I say only if you cook it, nimrod.”

“I already made it.” He swings the basket in his hand, silverware clinking, and dodges Sapnap’s sweaty side-hug with ease, wrinkling his nose at the shorter man. “Do _not_ touch me. I’ll throw you in the lake. You smell like fermented spider eye.”

Sapnap gasps in mock offense. They walk down the Prime Path to a little open field, bickering the whole way.

Karl plops down, heedless of the nighttime dew, and tugs Sap down by his wrist.

They picnic under the stars. Karl has seen those same constellations across the ages, has seen hundreds of empires fall beneath this same sky, but the night sky is never as bright and full of possibilities as when he’s with Sapnap.

. . . 

He slips out the window later that night.

He looks back once, at Sapnap still sleeping, hair mussed and face peaceful. He looks so soft in the moonlight, quiet and beautiful, and Karl’s heart aches for a moment.

Yes, when he returns to the future, Sapnap will still be there. Logically, depending on what time Karl jumps to, Sapnap will always be there. 

Some part of him still wants to stay. He loves this Sapnap, the one who’s not yet been stabbed in the back by his best friends, betrayed and abandoned at every turn, burns and scars etched across his unmarred skin. It hurts Karl to see his Sap in pain.

Yes, he has duties to fill, obligations and guidelines to meet, as predetermined by the time sorcerers of millennia past. It’s Karl’s job to protect and preserve, and it’s a job he does with pride. But goodbyes have never been his strong suit.

A whisper in the night. “I will see you soon, my love.” 

And he will.

He is a shadow in the night, flitting through the tall grass. He pauses only for a moment, looking over to L’Manberg, whose blackstone walls are whole and unbroken. _A very big and not-blown-up L’Manberg._ Then on, onwards to his hidden library under a hill, jotting down notes and observations from this trip in his prized journal, and slipping through the time warp portal.

It’s as if he was never there.

When he exits the portal, nauseous from being yanked through the fabric of time, the air smells of brimstone and metal. Outside, the SMP lies in shambles. L’Manberg little more than a crater, the community house blown up, his friends scattered to the winds. Such a sharp contrast to the harmonious and peaceful land it had once been.

And there’s still one more person Karl has to talk to.

. . . 

“Does it ever get easier?”

“What?”

“Watching everyone you love die, and knowing you cannot join them.”

And Dream, who has lived for a thousand years and will live for countless more, has to answer that no, it does not. “I guess—you get used to it. That's the best answer I can give you. But easier? Never. It’s like having your heart ripped out of your chest, again and again.” The lava glows ominously against the walls of Dream’s cell. Karl’s been to visit the prison before, mostly after a particularly challenging journey. As an immortal and a time traveler, Karl’s run into Dream more than a few times over centuries past. They have an understanding, of a sort. 

“You know, I’ve never actually stayed long enough to watch anyone die of old age. I’m too scared.”

Dream hums in quiet acknowledgment. “I wouldn’t, either, if I could avoid it.”

“Someday, I will. It’s my dream to settle down with some incarnation of Sapnap. Time still affects me, you know. I’m gonna grow old with him.”

Dream’s face is pained. He will never, ever have that. And that’s why Karl still visits him, still feels sympathy for the monster who’d been the root of such destruction and pain on the SMP. All Dream had wanted was for everyone to be one big happy family. Because they would be dead soon enough, and Dream would be left with the memories. “I’m happy for you, Karl. I am. Doesn’t change the fact that I envy you. I thought George and I could have had that, or something like it.” Karl knows George hasn’t been to visit the prison once since its construction. “But I fucked it up. I fucked everything up, actually. You may not believe it, but I regret it, to some extent. Because I might—I might never have that again.” He looks up at Karl, who’s leaning against the wall. His green eyes are full of sorrow and pain. “I’m tired, Karl. I’m so, so tired.”

And there is no way out. Not for him. Not even if he tried, which Karl knows he has. 

Karl scrubs his face with his shirt sleeves and runs a hand through his hair. 

As soon as he walks out of here, everything will be as it always is. They’ve both done it all a hundred times before. 

Karl will go talk to Sapnap, maybe Quackity and George. He’ll stay in this timeline for a while, recharge his powers. Then he’ll be gone, off to another time and place. He’s already been in this one for too long. Karl Jacobs is as permanent as the surface of a rippling puddle. He is running, always running, too terrified to face what might greet him if he stays for too long in one place. 

Dream will stay in his cell. He will stare at the wall, unaffected by the passage of time, maybe take a few visitors. He will remain in prison until he is released or until its walls crumble around him and everyone who remembers his crimes lay dead. Dream is permanent as life itself, as the sun and moon and stars. He cannot run, cannot escape, no matter how hard he tries. Karl pities him, just a bit. 

Yes, they’ve both done this all a hundred times. But as it is, they’re the last two stars in the sky to burn out. And saying goodbye will never get easier. 

Karl pushes off the wall. “I’ll see you around, Dream.”

Dream grins wryly, but Karl can still see the shadow of grief behind it. “You always do.”

**Author's Note:**

> how do people write more than 2k words this shit is exhausting
> 
> n e waze [twitter](https://twitter.com/honkblade) smile


End file.
